“A Herodotus of the 21st century.” That is how the Irish Left Review described, in highly flattering terms, the landmark book by Oxford University Professor of Global History Peter Frankopan, The New Silk Roads: The Present and Future of the World (published in Greek by Alexandria Publications). Perhaps not unfairly, as the distinguished British historian has spent years trying to free the Western gaze from its fixation on a version of world history that begins in Europe and expands outward.
Shortly before the end of the year, we spoke with him about whether recent global developments have vindicated his analysis, what lessons history can teach us in understanding the challenges of the present moment, the revival of imperial thinking and the logic of walls, and why the twenty-first century will belong to the networks linking Asia with the rest of the world.
Interview by Antonis D. Papagiannidis and Konstantinos Tsalakos
(Published in Economic Review - December 2025)
The Light of the East
Ex oriente lux? You were bold enough to draw our attention to an interpretation of world history in which not only Byzantium, but also the East and the Silk Roads, play a central role. Do you feel vindicated so far? Will the 21st century be an “Asian” century?
Yes, that is the short answer! If I were to give a longer one, I am not sure “vindicated” is the right word, because it sounds as though I was trying to prove something. The East has always played a pivotal role, even if that is often overlooked. Byzantium was never concerned solely with the Latin West. The Persians, Arabs, Pechenegs, and Mongols were its great rivals and interlocutors—not only militarily, but through culture, commerce, money, and power. The same was true of Rome long before that: its horizons were shaped as much by the Parthians and the Huns as by whatever was happening in Gaul or Britain.
When Constantinople minted its gold coins, they circulated as far as China, India, and East Africa. When silk from China arrived in the markets of Antioch, it influenced fashion—and tax revenues—across the Mediterranean.
What I tried to do was remind readers that history is not a story stretching outward from Europe, but rather a story of networks and connections: movement, exchange, adaptation, and competition. These networks have always pulsed most intensely across Asia, home to more than four billion people and an extraordinary share of the world’s mineral, food, and energy resources.
Asia is also central to tomorrow’s opportunities and challenges. Seventy-five percent of all graduates in science, technology, engineering, and medicine study in Asia. Countries such as China, India, Malaysia, South Korea, Singapore, and many others dominate fields that shape the present and will shape the future, including quantum computing, advanced materials, and much more.
So rather than feeling vindicated, I am surprised that we in the West still pay so little attention to these countries, either individually or collectively. Everyone knows the names Donald Trump, David Beckham, or even Nigel Farage, but who can name China’s biggest pop star or the trade minister of the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Singapore, or India? Who understands why Indonesia has created an almost monopolistic position in nickel production, or why Kazakhstan has become a critical hub in the energy networks connecting Russia and China?
The twenty-first century will not belong to “Asia.” It will belong to the webs that connect Asia to the rest of the world. In many ways, that has always been the story. The light has always come from the East. We simply need to remember to look in the right direction.
Lessons from the Past
What are the two most important lessons that Byzantine history and the Silk Roads can teach us today?
Two lessons stand out from the Byzantine era and the history of the Silk Roads, and both are particularly relevant today.
The first is the importance of institutions. The Byzantines excelled at building an administrative system that endured for more than a thousand years, functioning effectively even through wars, invasions, and political upheaval. The empire’s civil service, tax system, and military recruitment structures were designed to survive even when emperors died.
When Constantinople was sacked by the Crusaders in 1204, the bureaucracy regrouped in exile and was reestablished first in Nicaea and later back in the capital in 1261—evidence of institutional depth that transcended any individual ruler. Earlier, under Emperor Heraclius in the seventh century, the thematic system of provincial administration reorganized military and fiscal control in a way that allowed Byzantium to survive the loss of Egypt and Syria and remain stable for centuries.
This kind of resilience—built on systems rather than personalities—is something many modern states struggle to achieve today.
The second lesson is foresight. The Byzantines were exceptionally skilled at gathering information, planning ahead, and adapting to changing circumstances. In the mid-tenth century, for example, Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus sent envoys as far as the Volga and the Caspian Sea to gather intelligence on emerging trading partners and political threats.
The same habit of preparation can be seen across the Silk Roads more broadly. Merchants and diplomats throughout Asia’s great commercial backbone exchanged maps, weather reports, and pricing data long before the term “globalization” was ever coined. Vigilance regarding shifts in power, markets, and climate helped the Byzantines adapt where others collapsed.
Your work highlights how civilizations flourished by building bridges rather than walls. Today, however, many nations seem intent on tearing down those bridges. Which historical parallels concern you most? And beyond the obvious economic consequences, how might this new age of isolationism reshape our societies, cultures, and even our understanding of the world?
Civilizations thrive when they embrace exchange and falter when they turn inward.
The Byzantine Empire understood this well. It prospered when it acted as a bridge between worlds—for example, between Latin Christendom and the Islamic caliphates, between the Black Sea and the Italian maritime city-states, or more broadly between Europe and Asia. Constantinople’s markets in the eleventh and twelfth centuries buzzed with Venetian merchants, Armenian traders, and Arab envoys. This cosmopolitan energy was a source of strength.
By contrast, when Byzantium became defensive and suspicious—after the sack of 1204, for instance, or during the final Ottoman advance in the fifteenth century—it became fragile, isolated, and vulnerable. Part of this stemmed from political and emotional reactions, but it was also driven by economic pressure. Societies that become poorer—or think they are becoming poorer—often make choices that worsen their situation.
The same pattern runs through the history of the Silk Roads. The openness of the Tang dynasty to foreign ideas and goods in the seventh and eighth centuries, for example, produced one of the world’s great golden ages. When later rulers closed borders and suppressed external influences, China’s horizons narrowed and innovation and scientific progress slowed.
That is why I am concerned by the current turn toward protectionism and inward-looking politics. Walls—whether physical or ideological—restrict not only trade but also imagination. When nations stop engaging with one another, they stop learning from one another.
The danger is that societies become more anxious, less curious, and more susceptible to myths about their own uniqueness.
A New Multipolar World
Today, it seems that “we”—the West—have become increasingly inward-looking and eager to sever ties. Admittedly, a different part of the “East,” namely Russia, has caused seismic shocks through its aggression in Ukraine. Yet in the “Trump planet,” everyone connected in some way to Russia—China, India, and others—appears to be treated as an outcast. Is this a temporary trend, or is it here to stay?
It is easy to focus on the three big powers—the United States, Russia, and China—as if they alone determine the direction of the world. But the real story today is broader and more complex.
Other powers are shaping the future in decisive ways: India, Indonesia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, and even smaller states such as the UAE and Qatar, which, despite their size, carry enormous weight in energy, finance, and diplomacy. These countries are not simply choosing sides. They are pursuing their own interests, forging new partnerships, and rewriting the rules of engagement.
The instinct of both this and the previous Trump administration is to divide the world into camps—friends or enemies, allies or rivals—and to exclude those perceived as too close to Moscow or Beijing. But that overlooks the complexity of a multipolar world.
India, for example, buys discounted Russian oil while simultaneously expanding its ties with Washington. Saudi Arabia cooperates with China on technology and energy while remaining central to Western defense networks. Indonesia has become indispensable in the global nickel supply chain—vital for electric vehicles—and is using that leverage intelligently.
Is this trend toward isolation permanent? I doubt it.
The West has gone through periods of retrenchment before, such as in the 1930s and the 1970s, and they have never lasted indefinitely. Global challenges—from climate change to migration and digital governance—require cross-border cooperation, whether we like it or not.
What concerns me most is the tone: the casual assumption that disengagement is a sign of strength. History suggests the opposite. When the West retreats, others step forward—and no one waits for us to wake up or catch up.
Many believe we are witnessing the emergence of a multipolar—and often confrontational—world, with new spheres of influence taking shape. Do you think we are living through a revival of empires? And if so, what does that mean for what we used to call “Western hegemony” and for the global balance of power?
In some ways, yes. We are living in what could be described as an age of imperial revival.
No state today openly speaks the language of empire, yet many behave in ways that would be entirely familiar to earlier imperial powers. We see spheres of influence being redrawn—in Eastern Europe, across the South China Sea, in the Sahel, in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean, and even in the Arctic—through military build-ups, economic leverage, and control over infrastructure, data, and supply chains.
This does not necessarily mean a return to formal empires, but it does point to a world in which power is being contested more openly and where the West’s ability to set the agenda is diminishing rapidly.
Western political, economic, and cultural hegemony is not disappearing overnight, but it is certainly weakening. The United Kingdom replaced a prime minister after fewer than fifty days. France recently broke that record. The rise of both the far right and the far left worries many in Europe—and beyond.
And then, of course, there is Trump, who simultaneously competes and divides. There are many things that can be placed in the positive column—areas where U.S. policy has been effective. But the chaotic manner in which much of this has been carried out has damaged America’s reputation around the world.
The United States and its allies can no longer take loyalty or moral authority for granted. They must compete for attention, investment, and influence just like everyone else.
At the same time, emerging powers such as India, Turkey, Indonesia, and Brazil are advancing their own visions of world order—sometimes aligned with the West, sometimes not. Turkey, for example, possesses the third-largest diplomatic corps in the world. We should ask ourselves why, and what Turkish diplomats are trying to achieve.
Meanwhile, many others are also working to expand their influence. Russia presents its actions in Ukraine as part of a broader struggle against Western dominance, a narrative that finds receptive audiences, particularly in parts of Africa.
China likewise repeatedly challenges the existing international order, calling for reforms and encouraging others to do the same. Few doubt, however, that Beijing’s primary objective is to strengthen China’s own position in the world rather than that of others.
So yes, imperial thinking has returned. Influence depends on one’s ability to listen, engage, and persuade. Yet it is no surprise that we are witnessing the highest levels of defense and weapons spending in many decades.
We are living in dangerous times.
Multiple Overlapping Revolutions
Are there periods in history that resemble our own? Does it feel as though we are living through a revolutionary age?
No—or at least not yet.
Our world may feel as though it stands on the brink of catastrophe, and perhaps that may indeed happen, but we are not living through an era like the First or Second World War. Nor is this the age of the atrocities of the Greek Civil War. And our world is certainly not the one in which I grew up, when my generation was convinced that the rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union would eventually lead not only to conflict, but to nuclear war and certain mutual destruction.
What makes the present so unpredictable, however, is that we are living through multiple overlapping revolutions: technological, geopolitical, environmental, medical, and demographic.
Any one of these on its own would be destabilizing. Together, they create a sense of uncertainty that is difficult to decipher and even harder to manage.
There is also the concentration of immense wealth and the growing willingness of a small number of individuals to use that wealth to shape global politics.
Figures such as Elon Musk, who can influence the course of wars through control of satellite networks, or private financiers such as Peter Thiel, alongside major sovereign wealth funds directing hundreds of billions of dollars toward political and strategic goals, are part of a new type of power elite—unelected, largely independent, politically motivated, and increasingly global in reach.
So yes, it is understandable that our era feels revolutionary.
We may be standing at the dawn of a period of profound upheaval, but we are not yet in the age of crisis itself. That may still lie ahead. I hope it does not.
Demographics and Climate
According to many projections, in the not-so-distant future, eight out of every ten people on the planet will be from Asia or Africa. What does this mean for population movements in the coming decades? Can an inward-looking approach prevail?
By 2050, Asia and Africa together will account for nearly 80% of the world’s population—around 7.6 billion people out of a projected global total of 9.7 billion. Africa’s population is expected to double to 2.5 billion, while Asia’s will remain broadly stable at around 5 billion, although with significant internal shifts. India, for example, is projected to have nearly 1.7 billion people, while China’s population is expected to decline sharply.
These demographic changes alone will generate enormous movements of people—from rural areas to cities, from poorer regions to wealthier ones, and from areas most affected by climate change to those better able to sustain human life.
Already, more than 280 million people live outside their country of birth. The World Bank expects that number to rise sharply as droughts, heatwaves, and conflicts intensify.
The Sahel, for example, is warming 1.5 times faster than the global average. Central Asia is experiencing rapid temperature increases as well. Parts of South Asia are regularly facing wet-bulb temperatures approaching the limits of human survivability.
In such contexts, mobility will not be a choice—it will be a necessity.
Against this backdrop, the idea that societies in Europe or North America can simply shut their doors appears not only morally questionable but strategically naïve. Labor shortages, aging populations, and growing demand for workers in care services, construction, and high-tech industries require precisely the opposite strategy.
Japan and South Korea, traditionally cautious about immigration, are already experimenting with selective visa systems. Gulf states are restructuring their economies around remote and flexible work. The same is true of the European Union.
The major demographic shift toward Asia and Africa will therefore make mobility the defining feature of the next half-century. The challenge—and the opportunity—is to manage that mobility intelligently, humanely, and with a view toward the shared future of a world that will be younger, more urban, and more interconnected than ever before.
I also spend a great deal of time thinking about strategic vulnerabilities. I was invited to Number 10 Downing Street in late 2019 and was warned about the risk of a pandemic, as well as the lack of a global plan to deal with one. The timing could hardly have been more accurate, given that COVID-19 was about to emerge.
There are several other threats that we should be preparing for right now, as well as many opportunities.
In your book The Earth Transformed (published in Greek by Alexandria Publications), you argue convincingly that climate has been a decisive factor in the course of civilizations. In light of the accelerating climate crisis we face today, what lessons can we draw from the past—from societies that adapted and from those that did not—in shaping our response today?
Climate has always been a decisive force—one capable of undermining even the strongest societies or, alternatively, inspiring remarkable resilience and innovation.
The lessons from the past are stark and urgent.
A good example is the decline of the Maya civilization around the ninth century. We now have extraordinary new evidence showing that a succession of severe droughts affected agricultural production and undermined urban water systems.
This led to a loss of confidence in traditional leadership structures and belief systems. It also reduced revenues, which suppressed trade and encouraged both mass migration and violence.
The Maya did not collapse because of a single catastrophe, but because their political and social systems failed to adapt.
The same patterns can be observed elsewhere. Consider the Late Bronze Age Collapse around 1200 BC, when drought, crop failures, and population displacement across the eastern Mediterranean contributed to the downfall of major powers such as Mycenaean Greece and the Hittite Empire.
By contrast, the Byzantines in the sixth and seventh centuries confronted a period of volcanic cooling and pandemic by restructuring their economy, introducing new crops, and reforming their fiscal and administrative systems—a reminder that flexibility, not political grandstanding, determines survival.
All of this matters today.
I need only point to the fact that the first six months of this year alone generated $100 billion in damages in the United States from floods, wildfires, tornadoes, and other disasters.
That places immense pressure on communities, regions, and national systems alike.
The key lesson, I believe, is that societies that invest in knowledge, storage, and preparedness fare better. Data and information are the tools that transform crisis into opportunity.
The past also warns us that denial and delay are fatal. Environmental shocks expose inequality and magnify political weakness.
Geography and Global Politics
Land powers or sea powers? Does Mackinder and his concept of the “Heartland” hold the upper hand today? Is geopolitics—or geostrategy—the decisive factor shaping the future? Does geography determine everything?
I am not sure why we need to choose one or the other. Reality does not work that way.
Ports connect coastal regions to their hinterlands, so it seems strange to treat them as separate and distinct. I have always been cautious about the idea that it is useful to divide the world into land powers and sea powers, as though geography dictates destiny in such rigid terms.
Mackinder’s Heartland thesis—that whoever controls the great continental core of Eurasia controls the world—was brilliant for its time. But it was also a product of a very specific era: the age of empire, railways, and territorial competition.
Today, the boundaries are far more blurred.
I am less interested in the Heartland itself and more interested in the connections that run through and around it—the networks of trade, energy, data, and communication that link continents together.
The real story of power no longer lies in any particular geographical area, but in the spaces in between: undersea fiber-optic cables, rail corridors across Central Asia, pipelines stretching from the Caspian to the Eastern Mediterranean, supply chains extending from Shenzhen to Rotterdam, and digital routes that move ideas and capital in real time.
That does not mean geography no longer matters—far from it.
Geography still sets the boundaries of possibility. In Greece, for example, you cannot escape the gravitational pull of Southeastern Europe, Turkey, and the Aegean. For Finland, Russia, the Baltic region, and the North will always shape its horizons.
Geography remains the stage on which history unfolds.
But the performance has changed. The actors now move simultaneously through multiple dimensions—physical, digital, economic, and ecological.
In that sense, Mackinder’s contrast between the world of land and the world of sea has given way to a far more complex reality, where the true measure of power lies in who can navigate the spaces that connect both.
The Right Side of History?
In antiquity, empires—whether Byzantine or earlier Roman—used mercenaries and fought proxy wars. Do you believe the current version of this phenomenon, for example as seen in Ukraine, is geopolitically, historically, and morally sustainable or defensible in the long term?
Mercenaries have always been politically cheaper than conscripts.
Hiring others to fight spares leaders the much greater political cost of sending the sons and daughters of elites and middle-class families to war. This was true for the Romans and Byzantines, both of whom relied heavily on auxiliaries, federate forces, and foreign guards. It remains true today.
One thing I have noticed in Europe and the wider West is that the current generation does not feel the same obligation to fight for its country—or for “freedom”—that their parents and grandparents did.
Measures of willingness to serve in the armed forces have fallen sharply across both the United States and Europe. Polls consistently show that a majority of younger citizens would be reluctant to take up arms even in the face of a national crisis.
This reflects a deeper cultural shift: a world in which war is viewed as something conducted by specialists, machines, or other people—not by “us.”
The problem is that this kind of detachment makes proxy wars appear both morally and politically convenient.
And that matters, because many of the world’s largest—and worst—wars begin on the margins rather than between two great powers.
The First World War erupted in the Balkans, where Serbia acted as a proxy in rivalries among European empires that spiraled out of control.
Or consider ancient Greece. The Peloponnesian War, which began in 431 BC, did not start with a direct confrontation between Athens and Sparta. Instead, it emerged through their rival alliances—Corinth, Corcyra, and Potidaea—whose local conflicts drew the larger powers into war.
That is what makes today’s world so unsettling.
The use of mercenaries and proxies may seem like an efficient way of managing risk, but it also makes escalation easier, accountability harder, and moral boundaries more ambiguous.
These historical examples should serve as a warning that insufficient attention is being paid to how crises can escalate into epic tragedies.
We are witnessing what many describe as a collapse of international law, from Ukraine to Gaza. In attempting to justify their actions, many political leaders claim they stand on the “right side of history.” Is there such a thing as a “right side of history”? And if so, where do the West and the East stand today?
That is a very good question—and not an easy one to answer.
In history, there are rarely clear-cut “right” and “wrong” sides. Much depends on who is telling the story—and when.
The phrase “the right side of history” often says more about confidence than it does about truth. It also reveals something about who gets to write history in the first place.
What is clear, however, is that both the West—as a more or less unified bloc—and the many voices across the East see themselves as defenders of order, legality, and justice.
They simply define those concepts in different, and sometimes contradictory, ways.
The West invokes a rules-based international order that it helped create. Others argue that those rules were never applied consistently and now seek to rewrite them.
And recently we have even seen senior officials in the United States claim that the postwar international order was used against American national interests.
Seriously?
(Photo by David Levenson/Getty Images)